1. Technical Field
The current invention relates to electronic order processing. In particular, this invention provides an order processing system, method, and program product for processing a plurality of order request types using one of a plurality of request handlers.
2. Background Art
Electronic financial transactions are becoming increasingly popular. For example, numerous retailers now offer web sites in which consumers can select and purchase items that are subsequently delivered to the consumer. The popularity of internet commercial transactions is driven by both the increased accessibility for consumers to place orders (available 24 hours, never leave home, etc.), and the substantially reduced costs incurred by the retailers in maintaining an electronic purchasing system when compared to maintaining a physical store.
Because of these benefits, various government offices and service-based businesses are also increasingly seeking to implement electronic transactions. For example, many government agencies desire to offer citizens the opportunity to perform various transactions, including motor vehicle registration renewals, license renewals, records requests, etc. through an electronic system. These systems would beneficially result in both a reduced cost of doing business for the government agency, and an increased satisfaction among citizens dealing with government offices. However, the expertise and expense of implementing these systems can be prohibitive. Additionally, many service providers, retailers, and government entities do not desire to obtain and verify electronic credit card transactions, known as payment processing.
Current implementations also lack the ability to provide order management, or do not allow the user interface to be separated from the order management system. As a result, current systems either lack the necessary functionality, or lack flexibility (including reusability) for many applications. Further, many systems are based on a “shopping cart” model in which the consumer selects physical items with preset prices. However, many government and service-based businesses do not fit well in the “shopping cart” model. Therefore, these systems cannot be used to implement transactions for these entities.
As a result, there exists a need for an order processing system in which the generation of an order request is performed independently from order management and payment processing functions.